16. DESTRUCTION OF Covent Garden ThEATRE BY FIRE, 1856

160

176

21. THE LAMB AND FLAG PUBLIC-HOUSE IN ROSE

STREET

256

COVENT GARDEN

CHAPTER I

Early history-Derivation of name-First owner-Bedford House-Sir W. Cecil's lease-Letting out of the

property.

was the

"CAN these dry bones live ? question put to Ezekiel by the Spirit of God in a vision. And the prophet was bidden to prophesy upon them, and the "bones came together, and the sinews and the flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above."

A similar task is set before any one who desires to revive the dead past of any locality; to clothe with flesh and blood its bony squares and streets, and to set them moving once more with the hum of life, the encounters of wits and statesmen, the busy throng of poets and critics, the full-flushed tide of blood that animated the scholars, the

traders, the intriguing courtiers, and the many-headed mob, whose bones, now dry, once hustled and pushed and throve and elbowed their way to their own objects in the streets and squares that know them no

more.

To realise such a vision completely would require the inspired eye of the prophet. To attempt it by means of the careful study of old authorities is the object of this book.

No one will deny that Covent Garden is one of the most interesting spots in the metropolis. It was once part of the open country between the City and the village of Charing. The neighbouring Abbey of Westminster acquired it, and its monks used it as a garden and burial-ground.

It was subsequently granted by the Crown to the Russell family, who improved the property to such an extent that it rapidly became notable not only as the haunt of fashion, but also as that of vice.

The first official notice of Covent Garden in any plan of London is in a map by Aggas published in the reign of Elizabeth.

It there appears as a small oblong space enclosed by a brick wall, and bounded on the south by a highway, the Strand (then a small lane), and on the north by fields and meadows extending as far as the heights of Hampstead and Highgate. Maitland says it dates back from 1222, and Mr. Hare ("Walks in London ") says it was originally known as Frère Pye Garden. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries its appellation was Convent Garden, no doubt because of its use by the monks of Westminster. Mr. Timms says that in 1632 it was called " coven' or "common" garden. The latter appellation is obviously one of those "translations" such as Bottom underwent; such as may be seen in the signs of inns all over the land, whereby the Bacchanals became the Bag-o'-nails, and the Boulogne Mouth was converted into the Bull and Mouth.

In a legal document of 9 Eliz. we find "some messuages with garden thereto called "the Convent Garden.'

Also, after the death of Francis, Earl of Bedford, it was found that he held "1 acras terre et pasture, cum partinentiis vocat.

the Convent Garden, jacentes in parochia S. Martini in campis juxta Charinge-Cross in Com. Midd. ac vii acras terre et pasture vocat. the Longe Acre adjacentes prope Convent Garden predicta." (A beautiful specimen of Monk-lawyer Latin, the perpetration of which by any fourth-form boy to-day would arouse in his headmaster a desire to correct his terminations.)

The earliest proof met with that Covent Garden belonged to the Abbey Church of Westminster is found in Malcolm's "Londinium Redivivum," 1803,* where it is stated that in 1539, when the possessions of the Church were being confiscated, that Abbey was compelled to accept lands belonging to the disestablished Priory of Hurley in exchange for its manor of Hyde and several others, including Covent Garden. The latter, close to London, was obviously more valuable than the former, but the monks, being no longer top-dog, had to "take it or leave it." Doubtless Henry VIII. quoted the handy proverb, "Exchange is no robbery," and one doesn't argue with "the master of thirty legions," whose premiss * See Appendix.